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Maximizing exposure therapy

Michelle Craske & colleagues from the Anxiety Disorders Research Center of UCLA have, for many years, been publishing careful, challenging research on underlying mechanisms & on ways of boosting the effectiveness of exposure therapies for different forms of anxiety.  Craske's list of publications & research presentations runs to 31 pages and begins with a study on musical performance anxiety published in 1984.  As the presentation titles on her list show, for some years the majority of her many lectures at prestigious conferences all over the world have revolved around the theme of how to take evolving scientific findings about fear learning and use them to optimize exposure treatments for anxiety disorders.

Birmingham BABCP conference: second day - NICE, emotion regulation, and exposure with depression & with cycloserine (4th post)

So yesterday was the second full day of the BABCP conference.  I have already written initial blog posts about the first day of the conference and about the pre-conference workshop I went to on emotion regulation.  This is a bit of a pre-breakfast scamper over yesterday's experiences.  As with the other blog posts I've written about the conference & the emotion regulation workshop, I intend to re-visit the more personally relevant subjects in future posts.

Working with traumatic memories: KISS (keep it simple, stupid) and the virtues of straightforward prolonged exposure

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication."  Leonardo da Vinci

"It seems that perfection is reached not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away."  Antoine de Sainte Exupery 

I have just written a series of three posts on Arntz & Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice"  This led to a query about when we should use direct exposure to trauma memories, when introduce more deliberate cognitive restructuring of linked trauma beliefs, and when add in more complex rescripting as, for example, described by Arntz & Jacob?

BABCP spring meeting: David Barlow's unified protocol - interoceptive/situational exposures and relapse prevention (sixth post)

I wrote yesterday about "Emotional avoidance, emotion driven behaviours & physical sensation tolerance (fifth post)".  Today's is the last post in this series of six on David Barlow & colleagues' new unified protocol for treating anxiety, depression & other related psychogical disorders.  It covers the last two modules in their eight module treatment - "Interoceptive & situational emotion exposures" (4 to 6 sessions) and "Maintenance & relapse prevention" (1 session). 

BABCP spring meeting: David Barlow's unified protocol for the treatment of emotional disorders - description (second post)

So yesterday was the first (workshop) day of the two day British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) Spring Workshops and Conference.  Between arriving from Edinburgh on the sleeper and starting the day, I hunkered down in a cafe for breakfast and wrote some introductory thoughts about the workshop I was due to go to.  The publicity material said we would "review recent evidence supporting and discuss applications of the Unified Protocol for Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders (UP), an emotion-focused, cognitive-behavioural treatment designed to be applicable across the anxiety, mood, and related disorders."  I wrote pre-workshop "My current understanding of the field is 1.) It looks like these more unif

BABCP spring meeting: David Barlow's unified protocol for the treatment of emotional disorders - introduction (first post)

Just off the sleeper.  Slept like a baby - well maybe better, knowing some babies.  Now it's two days of the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) Spring Workshops and Conference.  Today it's workshops and we have a choice of half a dozen or so.  I've plumped for David Barlow's "Unified protocol for the treatment of emotional disorders".  The publicity reads:

This workshop will review recent evidence supporting and discuss applications of the Unified Protocol for Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders (UP), an emotion-focused, cognitive-behavioural treatment designed to be applicable across the anxiety, mood, and related disorders. 

Writing (& speaking) for resilience & wellbeing 2: traumas & difficulties

Fear is the mind-killer ... I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.  Bene Gesserit "Litany against Fear" from "Dune" by Frank Herbert

You can access a downloadable Word format version of this post by clicking here  .

Handouts & questionnaires for obsessive compulsive disorder & body dysmorphic disorder

Here are a collection of downloadable forms, questionnaires and handouts that I use when working with people struggling with obsessive compulsive disorder and body dysmorphic disorder.

Normal intrusions - a list of 52 "normal intrusive thoughts" with the percentage of 293 students (none of whom had been diagnosed with a mental health problem) who reported that they had experienced this thought.  I often hand out this leaflet to help people realize that experiencing occasional disturbing intrusive thoughts is totally normal.

OCD diagnosis & prevalence - leaflet giving DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for obsessive-compulsive disorder and some details of prevalence rates.

Handouts & questionnaires for problem solving & behavioural activation

Here are a series of forms, questionnaires and handouts that I use regularly in my work.  The problem solving diagram is a recurring theme - both at the start of therapy and as a sheet to return to when reviewing and considering additional therapeutic options.  Other sheets are classic variants on the tools used by many cognitive behavioural therapists - with occasional alternatives and additions, that I've come up with over the years, thrown in as well.

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